Water-wheel



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UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JOHN BLOCHER, OF WILLIAMSVILLE, NEW YORK.

WATER-WHEEL.

Specification of Letters Patent No. 29,457, dated August 7, 1860.

T o all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JOHN BLocHER, of l/Villiamsville, in the county of Erie and State of New York, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Vater-l/Vheels; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description of the same, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, forming a part of this specification, in which- Figure 1 represents a side view. Fig. 2, a horizontal section, and F ig. 3, a section of a detached portion of the machine.

Similar letters of reference, in each of the several figures indicate corresponding parts.

The nature of my invention consists in the combination of a number of ratchet toothed wheels arranged upon one shaft, a chain of buckets hinged together by knife edged joints formed of curved flanges at top and bottom of the buckets and self-adjusting bearings of a guide roller shaft for the purposes hereinafter to be described.

To enable others skilled in the art, to make and use my invention, I will proceed to describe its construction and operation.

A chain of buckets C, is supported upon two or more wheels A, of a horizontal shaft Gr, and its lower part is guided by rollers D, upon a shaft E, near the surface of the escape water. The shaft E, has its bearings in vertical slots F, in the frame of the 'machine and the weight of the shaft and rollers E, D, keep them down so that the surface of the rollers bears against and serves as a guide for the buckets forming the chain.

The wheels A, haveratchet tooth shaped serrations around their circumference, the recesses serving as bearings for the lower ends of the buckets, while the straight surfaces extending each from the top of one recess to the bottom of the next recess, serve to support the backs of the buckets. The length of the straight surface between each two recesses is equal to the length of one bucket.

The top of the back part of each bucket is provided with a curved flange z', and its lower edge is also formed into a similar curved flange y', only that the upper flange is curved backward and downward, while the bottom flange is curved forward and upward. The top flange of one bucket is hung into the bottom flange of the bucket above it, and so forth, whereby a continuous chain of buckets is formed. The joint between each pair of buckets being similar to a scale beam or knife edge oint. This form of joint obviates friction and dispenses with an axial rod.

At times of high or low water, the chain may be shortened or lengthened by taking out or inserting a number of buckets and hooking the ends of the chain together'. It will be seen that this can be done without difficulty by just unhooking the buckets which it is desired to remove, and without the necessity of removing any other portion of the machine except these buckets.

The rollers D, will adapt themselves to any length of chain as the slot F, forming the bearing of the roller shaft E, allows the latter to descend or rise in conformity to the length of chain. Thus it will be seen the lower part of the chain can always and with great ease and rapidity be adjusted so as to suit the higher or lower lever of the escape water.

Another great advantage of this arrangement is that any defective bucket may be removed and another one inserted without stopping the machine any longer than the time necessary to remove one bucket and insert another one, and without the necessity of waiting until the defective bucket has been repaired.

What I claim as my invention, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

'Ihe combination of a number of ratchet toothed wheels arranged upon one shaft, a chain of buckets hung together by knife edge joints formed of curved flanges at top and bottom of the buckets and self adjusting bearings of a guide roller shaft, substantially as and for the purposes set forth.

JOHN BLOCHER.

Witnesses:

R. W. FENWICK, GOODWIN T. A'r LEE. 

